


how to love a ghost

by honeyspeaches



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Immortality, humanish, idek this is an angsty mess basically
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-06
Updated: 2015-12-06
Packaged: 2018-05-05 06:25:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5364821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeyspeaches/pseuds/honeyspeaches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“My name’s Lydia. And I love you, Scott. God, I love you so much I can’t stand it. Please know that. I’m Lydia. I’ve loved you since the beginning of time and I will love you until the end. Please don’t die, not again.” </p>
<p>Lydia is immortal and everyone she loves dies, and Scott reappears every few centuries for her to love and lose all over again. Everyone is human except Lydia, who's still ambiguously a banshee and, obviously, immortal. If you don't like angst you should probably not read this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	how to love a ghost

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly don't even know what this is but I want to cry a little bit. Vaguely inspired by the film 'Age of Adaline' and also by Ryan Star's song 'Losing Your Memory'. This wasn't even a Lydia/Scott story when I started, so that should tell you what a mess it is. Be warned: only very barely edited. 
> 
> Let me know what you think! I hope you enjoy :)

**how to love a ghost**

 

***

 

Lydia stops ageing on her seventeenth birthday, or at the very least that’s when she stops noticing it. She supposes, technically, she might be eighteen or nineteen or maybe even twenty, but that’s irrelevant. What’s relevant is that her seventeenth birthday occurred during the Trojan War, and today she still looks exactly the same as she did then. It doesn’t bother her, until she realises the implications that come with immortality.

 

\--

 

The first person she loses is Jackson, who didn’t love her but was going to marry her regardless. She wasn’t certain she loved him, either, but that didn’t matter. They were supposed to be together forever- mortal forever, not her own forever- but instead he dies at eighteen, not so much a hero as a legend people didn’t want to talk about.

 

It’s strange; she feels it when he dies. Something inside of her chest snaps, and he’s so far away and this has never happened before, but somehow she knows what’s happening. She screams so loudly that her parents call for the doctor. It’s all okay, though, because the Greeks eventually win the war and he hadn’t died for nothing.

 

\--

 

After Jackson, she teaches herself to stop caring. There’s no point in getting attached to a person when you know, ultimately, you’re going to lose them, and she gets quite good at it until Stiles comes along and ruins everything. He tumbles- quite literally- into her workshop, and he’s a laughing stranger with blood and dirt all over his hands and he’s waving a sword around like a madman, but she still helps him. Something about his obvious insanity is charming. “Sit,” she orders, before physically pushing him onto the bed. “Be still.”

 

They don’t speak as she works, rubbing healing salves into his wounds and stitching the torn skin back together. She glares at him when he tries to push himself back up, and he grins. “You could’ve just said you wanted me to stay,” he says, and she fights the urge to press a knife into the body she’d just put back together.

 

Stiles gets better, but he sticks around. He’s at her little workshop almost every afternoon, asking questions about her past that she doesn’t know how to answer, and when he kisses her she doesn’t stop him. She’s too close to this.

 

They’re together when she loses him, but not to death. “Marry me,” he says, for the millionth time, and when she says no, for the millionth time, he leaves. A year or so later she goes to his wedding- the bride is a pretty girl named Malia, who’s wild enough to make him look tame- and she feels it when he does die of natural causes in his old age, but this time she bites her lip and she doesn’t scream because maybe that way it won’t be true.

 

\--

 

Allison, a girl too wide-eyed and sweet for a world so cruel, is another mistake. She and Lydia are the ladies of the noble Cora Hale, and at first it’s just hidden smiles and the brushing of hands that linger too long. Surprisingly, Allison’s the one to actually do something about it; one night, after their duties are done, she corners Lydia by the stables. “Your hair is lovely,” she murmurs, and then she’s wrapping her slender fingers around it, and for once Lydia doesn’t care that she’s supposed to be detached. She wants this, dammit, and the universe cannot expect her to keep letting things go.

 

Some nights she and Allison share a bed, their legs caught between the blankets and each other, and it goes on for seven years before Allison finally asks, “How are you still so young, so pretty?” and Lydia curses herself. She knows she should’ve left earlier- she doesn’t want to hang for witchcraft- but she couldn’t. When she doesn’t provide a suitable answer, Allison, wrapped in one of Lydia’s cloaks, leaves, but it doesn’t matter because then she gets the plague and Lydia screams louder than she ever has before.

 

\--

 

Lydia had lost Jackson, who she hadn’t loved, and she’d lost Stiles, who she had loved, and she’d lost Allison, who she had needed. It’s the same for all of them- she hurts for a while, and then she makes herself stop.

 

And then there’s Scott, who just keeps coming back.

  
  


***

  
  


Scott McCall isn’t like any of the others she’d loved and lost. He isn’t proud like Jackson, or reckless like Stiles, or soft like Allison. Scott’s entirely himself, and everyone in the village loves him for it, so Lydia vows he won’t mean a thing to her. It’s easy that way, and besides, Stiles has just met Malia, and she isn’t really over it.

 

“I know you,” he says, smiling a smile with too many dimples, and she chokes a little on her drink. “You’re Stiles’s friend, right? The healer- Laya, was it?”

 

Shaking her head, she puts her glass down. “Lydia,” she corrects, not meeting his eyes. This boy is dangerous for a girl looking to be alone, because he’s the kind of boy who makes that kind of girl never want to be alone again. “And Stiles and I… we’re not friends. But I am a healer, so two out of three isn’t that bad.”

 

Why won’t he stop smiling? “I’m going to buy you a drink,” he announces after a moment of consideration, gesturing for the barmaid to bring them both refills. “You look awfully sad, Miss Lydia, and I don’t like my friends to be sad.”

 

“We’re not friends,” she says instantly, horrified at the thought. She doesn’t have friends and she doesn’t plan to start making them. All she’d get out of friendship would be pain when her friends inevitably died.

 

Scott laughs as their drinks arrive. “Maybe not,” he allows. “But we will be.”

 

\--

 

As it is, he turns out to not be wrong. She’s not entirely sure how it happens, but soon enough they are friends- though, to be fair, she doubts they would be if it weren’t for his relentless pursuit of building some kind of kinship with every person he meets. Thankfully, he doesn’t seem interested in her romantically, so there’s no chance of them falling in love. Losing him will be easier that way.

 

It’s okay, until he asks about Stiles. “I know you say you’re not friends,” he says, leaning against his family’s stall at the markets. “But you were, weren’t you? You were something, that’s for sure. He talked about you all the time- still does.”

 

That’s unfortunate, she thinks, since he’s just become engaged, but it’s none of her business so she doesn’t comment on it. “He loved me,” she says slowly, trying to wrap her mind around the words. “And I… I couldn’t give him what he wanted.”

 

“You didn’t love him?”

 

“I did. I do.”

 

Scott sighs. “Well, he’s an idiot,” he says grandly, loud enough that some of the passerbys send him confused looks. He waves them along, appeasing them with that gorgeous smile of his. “If he loved you, he should have been desperate for anything you could give. He shouldn’t have asked for more.”

 

The wind blows Lydia’s hair around her face, and then his hand is warm on top of hers. He squeezes with just the right amount of pressure, and she leans into his chest as he wraps his arms around her chest. She doesn’t deserve a friend so lovely.

 

\--

 

She gets a sick sense of satisfaction when Stiles and Malia’s wedding is a total disaster, and she feels terrible, but the whole affair really is a complete and utter mess. It starts with Malia tripping and tearing her dress, as well as getting it covered in mud, and it only gets worse from there, but they seem happy.

 

While Lydia’s delegated to the back section of the crowd, Scott is right up the front with Stiles, and both men keep stealing glances back at her. She would love, right then, for the ground to swallow her whole. Surely the underworld is less uncomfortable than this.

 

After the ceremony, everyone goes to the river and drinks too much.

 

“Stiles is an idiot,” Scott says, using a tree to prop himself up. His speech is clear but the last time he’d tried walking he’d tripped and nearly crashed both himself and Lydia to the ground. “For losing you, I mean. You’re so special and I can’t believe he didn’t see that.”

 

The problem isn’t that Stiles hadn’t seen how special she was- it’s that he did see it, and couldn’t let it go. Stiles had wanted everything and would settle for nothing less. She had a feeling that Scott would settle for anything.

 

Lydia wants to kiss Scott, and she knows she shouldn’t, but she’s been so good and so careful that she deserves something. She takes his hand in her own and tilts her face up to his. “You see it, though,” she whispers. “That’s all that matters.”

 

The kiss is sweet and soft and lasts an eternity and the next morning he doesn’t remember a thing. It’s probably for the best.

 

\--

 

Lydia is a fleeting presence in Scott’s life and he an even more fleeting presence in hers. She leaves his town less than a year after Stiles’s wedding, and she departs as his friend even though they’d both wanted more. Scott dies before Stiles, but he still lives a long life, and she doesn’t scream because this is natural, this is okay, and no one’s hurting. She hopes he was happy, that he didn’t spend his life missing her like she did with him.

  
  


***

  
  


It’s like the universe sends her love in clusters, because the next time she meets Scott is upon her arrival at the Hale estate and she gets there just in time to see him propose to Allison. This has been a long time coming, apparently, because even the Hales are ecstatic about it. Cora’s already planning the wedding, and the brooding Derek cracks a smile when Allison agrees to marry Scott. It’s perfect.

 

Lydia spends the night alternating between throwing up and crying. She’s never before met someone from a previous lifetime, and she hates that the first is Scott. Couldn’t she have been given a test run to prepare? It might have been nice to meet another Malia, but then, anything would have been better than this.

 

When Allison asks if Lydia will be working with the Hales long enough to attend the wedding, Lydia blinks and forces a smile and says she hopes so.

 

This new Scott doesn’t love her. He doesn’t even know who she is.

 

\--

 

“Have we met?”

 

Lydia, hanging a number of Cora’s gowns in the sun to dry, gives a small shriek at the sudden sound. She spins around and Scott’s standing there, the sun glinting off his skin and making him look like some kind of ethereal being sent to taunt her. None of this is fair, and she can’t decide whether she dreads or anxiously awaits the day he and Allison marry and leave this place. It will be easier then, she hopes.

 

The question hangs in the air between them for a moment. She shakes her head. “No,” she says, turning away and glancing at the grass. “I don’t believe we have. I’m not even from around here, actually.”

 

“Oh,” he says. “Are you from Ireland?”

 

She can’t help it; she laughs. “Not quite that far,” she says after she stops, still smiling. “I’m from the north.”

 

Scott helps her fold one of the already dry pieces of clothing and drops it into her basket. “My mistake, I guess,” he says, continuing to help with the rest of her chores. “You look familiar, is all. Maybe I’ve known a distant relative.”

 

As he’s leaving, she can’t help herself. “You and Allison seem very happy,” she calls, selfishly hoping he’ll contradict her.

 

Shielding his eyes against the sun and squinting at her, he flashes a brief smile. “Yeah,” he calls back. “We are.”

 

\--

 

A part of her expects him to fall back in love with her, but he doesn’t, or maybe he’s going to but doesn’t get the chance. It comes to light that Allison is only marrying him because her father requested it, and Scott leaves in the middle of the night before anyone can convince him to stay.

 

Lydia finds out a year later that he’d died three nights after he left, and figures she didn’t know because this time, they didn’t know each other, not really. She’s okay with this, but he still haunts her dreams.

  
  


***

  
  


Speakeasies are overrated, but Lydia spends her nights dabbling in them despite this. She likes having the excuse to let go and forget how terribly lonely she is. When she can invest her time in pretty girls and pretty boys who don’t want to see her in the morning, it’s easier to not dwell on those who wanted her forever.

 

It’s at one of these parties that she finds Scott for the third time.

 

Scott, in spite of all his good qualities, has succumbed to the allure of the hat. Lydia’s too old to keep up with the current fashions, and she doesn’t even know what the hat’s called, but it’s horrifically ugly, and it’s this that convinces her to speak to him.

 

“You look ridiculous,” she says, sliding up beside him at the bar. There’s a half-empty drink sitting before him- she snatches it and downs what’s left in one gulp before continuing. “The hat, I mean. The rest of you’s alright.”

 

A grin creeps its way up his familiar face. “Alright, am I?” he asks, shifting in his seat to face her properly. She nods, returning his smile. “Y’know, I don’t think anyone’s ever said such a sweet thing to me- and you, darlin’, are far from alright. You’re positively radiant. Effervescent. Luminous, even. Anyone ever told you that?”

 

Lydia laughs. “Those are a lot of big words,” she says. “Are you trying to impress me, or are they just the only words you know?”

 

Scott shrugs. “Both,” he admits. “I’m Scott, by the way.”

 

I know, she thinks, but all she says is, “That’s nice.”

 

\--

 

Every Friday night continues in much the same manner for weeks, and she never tells him her name. She can’t ruin him if he doesn’t even know who she is. The only problem is that she wants him to know her, and that’s a scary thought.

 

They’re together when the police arrive, banging on doors and trying to shut down the party, and he grabs her hand with just a little too much familiarity for her to be comfortable with it. “Run,” he whispers, and even though they could get in serious trouble there’s an excited glint in his eyes, like it’s nights like these that he lives for.

 

The streets are dark but full of people, and she doesn’t think as he pulls her down a number of less crowded side-streets. He seems to know where he’s going, and she doesn’t want to get caught, so she doesn’t complain when they stop in a dark alley. His palms press against the brick wall behind her, an arm on either side of her head keeping her exactly where he wants her. “That was fun,” he says, grinning. “We should do it again sometime, darlin’.”

 

Lydia’s laugh is cut off by his mouth against her own, warm and insistent and tasting of liquor. The kiss isn’t like their first, all those centuries ago. It’s hungry and wild and desperate and this is everything she wants, the one thing she’s never been able to let go of. She wraps her arms around his neck and he wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her up until her legs are hooked behind his back and there’s no space between them and she doesn’t even notice the pain as her back hits the wall.

 

“What’s your name?” he murmurs as his lips move to her neck. “I want to know your name.”

 

Even in her current state, she doesn’t tell him. She’d likely give him anything else, anything he wanted would be his, but she can’t tell him who she is. No matter how much she wants to, she can’t risk getting too attached to leave.

 

She shakes her head slowly. “I- no, I can’t,” she says softly, almost hoping he doesn’t hear her. “Please, Scott. I can’t. Please don’t make me.”

 

Scott is silent as he lets her go. Her feet hit the ground with a faint thud, and he shoves his hands into his pockets. “I wouldn’t make you do anything you don’t want to do,” he says, and then he won’t meet her eyes. “I need to go. See you around, darlin’.”

 

That’s when Lydia’s heart shatters completely.

 

\--

 

It’s by pure chance that she’s there when he’s shot. She doesn’t know the attackers, but she supposes they’re just common thugs, and crack of the trigger rings in her ears as she drops to her knees beside him.

 

“You’re okay,” she tells him, pressing her hands against the wound. There’s so much blood. “You’ll be fine, Scott, you hear me? You’re going to be perfectly alright.” She wants so desperately to be telling the truth.

 

Then he starts coughing red, and she knows she’s lying.

 

“You’re so pretty, darlin’, did I ever tell you that?” he asks through his chattering teeth. Even now, he’s smiling.

 

Lydia cracks a smile of her own to make him feel better. “I don’t think you did,” she says. “Radiant and effervescent and luminous, sure, but I don’t think you’ve ever called me pretty.” She moves one hand from the blood to his cheek, leaving red all over his golden skin.

 

“My mistake,” he says. “I’m always forgetting my manners. You’re very pretty, darlin’.”

 

When his eyes start to unfocus, she pulls her hands back altogether and clenches her fists. This isn’t fair. She leans in close to his ear, because this isn’t for the world. This is only for him. “Lydia,” she murmurs. “My name’s Lydia. And I love you, Scott. God, I love you so much I can’t stand it. Please know that. I’m Lydia. I’ve loved you since the beginning of time and I will love you until the end. Please don’t die, not again.”

 

In the end, she doesn’t even want to scream. She just cries and cries and cries, and lets her tears mingle with the blood on his cheek. She’d hoped, just this once, that she might not lose him, but she knows they’re always doomed.

  
  


***

  
  


Beacon Hills is a small town and it loves her. She’s pretty and aloof and not all that bright, qualities the modern world idolises, and she finds it almost funny that Scott is the one person who doesn’t pay her any attention at all. It’s okay, because she doesn’t pay him any attention either, but she still can’t help staring at him every now and then. It’s truly magical, the total lack of physical differences between him and all his past selves.

 

From what she can tell, this Scott is most like the first Scott- or the first Scott she’d known, anyway. There’s no way of knowing how many other times he’s shown up throughout history. Maybe he’s even older than she is, or the concept of him is, at least.

 

That’s what she thinks it is. She doesn’t think he’s the same person because if he was he’d remember her and love her every time they meet. What she thinks is that the universe recognises that they got this one right, and keeps replicating the idea of him because the world is a better place with Scott McCall in it.

 

Either way, she’s glad. Loving and losing him hurts, but knowing he exists is a strange comfort.

 

The first time they speak, he looks confused. They’ve been paired together for a project after her successful avoidance of him for the past six months, and the library is quiet. “You’re Lydia,” he says. “And I’ve never spoken to you before.”

 

“That’s right,” she says, nodding and not looking at him.

 

Scott pauses. “But I know you,” he insists. “I don’t know how, but I do. Isn’t that weird?”

 

“Very weird,” she says. She’s trying her best to not pay him any attention, lest she accidentally let something slip. “Deja-vu, I guess.”

 

They work in solitary silence for the rest of their study session. As she’s gathering her books to leave, he glances up at her, his eyes hopeful and innocent and not at all pained. “We should go out sometime,” he says. “Y’know, if you want to.”

 

It’s his smile that gets her to agree.

 

\--

 

Scott is an excellent date. He takes her to a fancy restaurant, where they talk about their lives, and he takes her to a film, where they occasionally exchange sarcastic comments about how ridiculous the film is, and then they get ice cream, where they talk about each other. He pays for everything, and when he drops her home he walks her to the door and kisses her cheek and tells her he had a lovely time.

 

This isn’t what she wants.

 

It would be easier, she thinks, if he was terrible, and not someone worth loving for eternity, but he’s so good she can’t get over him. Even though she’s as cool and detached as she possibly can be without being a complete bitch, he still seems fascinated by her.

 

“I really like you,” he says to her one afternoon, and then he links their hands and kisses her and she doesn’t think the world can get any crueller than when he asks her to meet his mother. Even with everything they’ve been through, this is all so new to her.

 

\--

 

The night she decides she’s been in the one place for too long, she plans on leaving without saying goodbye, but then her car breaks down outside the vet’s surgery where he works, and that plan goes out the window.

 

“You’re leaving?” he asks, gesturing to the few bags she has sitting in the backseat. He doesn’t even seem mad, just sad, and maybe a little hurt. She doesn’t know what to say, so she just apologises. “It’s okay. Where are you headed?”

 

Lydia shrugs. “I haven’t decided yet,” she tells him, honestly. “Just… away. I can’t be here anymore. I’ll miss you, though. I really will.” She leans against the hood of the car, watching him, hoping he’ll just turn around and walk back inside and forget about her.

 

As usual, the situation doesn’t go anywhere near how she wants it to. Scott looks at her like he’s never looked at her before, not ever. “When we met, you said we didn’t know each other,” he says. “But that was a lie, wasn’t it? We do know each other.” His voice gets more confident as he goes on. This isn’t just speculation- it’s a truth. “I wish I could remember you.”

 

“It’s probably best that you don’t,” she says. “Our history isn’t the best, but it’s there. You and I have known each other for a very long time.”

 

It’s a relief to finally tell him, and the weight on her chest lifts- she doesn’t feel so sick and afraid anymore. She doesn’t tell him anymore- doesn’t explain how it’s possible- but she does pause as she turns to leave. “Hey, Scott?” she asks, and he raises his dark eyes to meet her own. “I love you. I really, really love you.”

  
  
***


End file.
